down himself, riddling their bodies with
bullets.
“Bring forward their work detail!” the guard cried.
Other men were pulled out of the ranks — prisoners
who had done nothing but work alongside the men
who’d run, prisoners who hadn’t tried to escape.
Rat-tat-tat-tat! The SS man shot them too. Then
the solider turned the gun on us in the roll call ranks. Rat-tat-tat - tat! I closed my eyes and prayed the bullets wouldn’t find me, trembling as prisoners were hit
and fell dead to the ground all around me. I couldn’t
move though. I couldn’t run. If I flinched, I would be
singled out and shot.
“This is the punishment for escape! All of you will
share the blame!” the watch officer yelled. He shot until
the machine gun ran out of bullets. Click-click-click.
The SS officer threw his weapon to the ground.
“Clean up this mess,” he ordered, and he marched
away, leaving us to carry away our own dead.
—
That night, in what little sleeping time there was left, I
dreamed that Amon Goeth was chasing me with his
dogs. I ran, and ran, and ran, but I could never quite
get away. Then one of the dogs leaped and bit my left
arm. I woke up screaming and holding my burning
left arm— my left arm where the Nazis had carved B-3087 into my skin.
Auschwitz
ConcentrationCamp,
1945
Chapter Nineteen
after a few months at bIrkenau, we were told Auschwitz needed workers. Since Auschwitz was
nearby, a sister camp to Birkenau, they marched us
down the road and across the fields to get there. Our kapo stopped us at the station, where we waited for
new prisoners to join us. You could tell they were new
because they stepped off the trains in real clothes,
not camp uniforms, with their luggage and children
in tow.
“Leave your luggage!” the Nazis told them.
“Why? We were told to bring it with us,” they
argued.
The Nazis promised them it would all be returned
to them in due time, and the new prisoners believed
them. The Nazis loved having new prisoners who
didn’t know what was coming. It amused them. I
could only feel sorry for these new arrivals. They had
no idea the waking nightmare that lay in wait for them.
“Have you heard of Auschwitz?” our kapo asked
the new prisoners. “No? Someone’s waiting for you
inside. Do you know who? Death, of course. Death
waits for you. Look and see.”
The new prisoners kept their distance from us veteran prisoners as we were herded toward the main gate.
They looked at us with wide eyes, and pulled their
children away from us. Did we look like monsters to
them? I glanced around at the other prisoners who had
come with me from Birkenau. We were skin and bones,
with shaved heads and shuffling gaits and red skin on
our arms where they’d tattooed us. Our eyes were
sunk into our heads, our ears stuck out like donkey
ears, and we must have smelled wretched, though of
course we’d all been long accustomed to our stench. I
was fifteen— maybe sixteen?— and I looked like a
sixty-year-old man. To these people just off the train,
we all must have looked like escaped mental-asylum
patients with our shaved heads and our wooden shoes
and oversized blue- and gray-striped uniforms.
If only they knew that this was what awaited them.
If they weren’t taken right to the gas chambers and the
furnaces.
We passed under the front gates of Auschwitz,
where the German words ARBEIT MACHT FREI were written above the gate. I knew enough German
to translate it: “Work makes you free.”
A smiling SS guard told us a very different story as
we passed. “You come in through the front gate,” he
said, “but the only way out is through the chimney.”
I looked up with the new prisoners to the tops of
the brick chimneys, where a thick black smoke poured
out into the blue-white sky. The crematorium. Little
flecks of gray fluttered down all around us, collecting
on puddles of water in the yard. I watched a little girl
in a blue dress catch one on her tongue like snow.
bullets.
“Bring forward their work detail!” the guard cried.
Other men were pulled out of the ranks — prisoners
who had done nothing but work alongside the men
who’d run, prisoners who hadn’t tried to escape.
Rat-tat-tat-tat! The SS man shot them too. Then
the solider turned the gun on us in the roll call ranks. Rat-tat-tat - tat! I closed my eyes and prayed the bullets wouldn’t find me, trembling as prisoners were hit
and fell dead to the ground all around me. I couldn’t
move though. I couldn’t run. If I flinched, I would be
singled out and shot.
“This is the punishment for escape! All of you will
share the blame!” the watch officer yelled. He shot until
the machine gun ran out of bullets. Click-click-click.
The SS officer threw his weapon to the ground.
“Clean up this mess,” he ordered, and he marched
away, leaving us to carry away our own dead.
—
That night, in what little sleeping time there was left, I
dreamed that Amon Goeth was chasing me with his
dogs. I ran, and ran, and ran, but I could never quite
get away. Then one of the dogs leaped and bit my left
arm. I woke up screaming and holding my burning
left arm— my left arm where the Nazis had carved B-3087 into my skin.
Auschwitz
ConcentrationCamp,
1945
Chapter Nineteen
after a few months at bIrkenau, we were told Auschwitz needed workers. Since Auschwitz was
nearby, a sister camp to Birkenau, they marched us
down the road and across the fields to get there. Our kapo stopped us at the station, where we waited for
new prisoners to join us. You could tell they were new
because they stepped off the trains in real clothes,
not camp uniforms, with their luggage and children
in tow.
“Leave your luggage!” the Nazis told them.
“Why? We were told to bring it with us,” they
argued.
The Nazis promised them it would all be returned
to them in due time, and the new prisoners believed
them. The Nazis loved having new prisoners who
didn’t know what was coming. It amused them. I
could only feel sorry for these new arrivals. They had
no idea the waking nightmare that lay in wait for them.
“Have you heard of Auschwitz?” our kapo asked
the new prisoners. “No? Someone’s waiting for you
inside. Do you know who? Death, of course. Death
waits for you. Look and see.”
The new prisoners kept their distance from us veteran prisoners as we were herded toward the main gate.
They looked at us with wide eyes, and pulled their
children away from us. Did we look like monsters to
them? I glanced around at the other prisoners who had
come with me from Birkenau. We were skin and bones,
with shaved heads and shuffling gaits and red skin on
our arms where they’d tattooed us. Our eyes were
sunk into our heads, our ears stuck out like donkey
ears, and we must have smelled wretched, though of
course we’d all been long accustomed to our stench. I
was fifteen— maybe sixteen?— and I looked like a
sixty-year-old man. To these people just off the train,
we all must have looked like escaped mental-asylum
patients with our shaved heads and our wooden shoes
and oversized blue- and gray-striped uniforms.
If only they knew that this was what awaited them.
If they weren’t taken right to the gas chambers and the
furnaces.
We passed under the front gates of Auschwitz,
where the German words ARBEIT MACHT FREI were written above the gate. I knew enough German
to translate it: “Work makes you free.”
A smiling SS guard told us a very different story as
we passed. “You come in through the front gate,” he
said, “but the only way out is through the chimney.”
I looked up with the new prisoners to the tops of
the brick chimneys, where a thick black smoke poured
out into the blue-white sky. The crematorium. Little
flecks of gray fluttered down all around us, collecting
on puddles of water in the yard. I watched a little girl
in a blue dress catch one on her tongue like snow.
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